August 27, 2012

old filing cabinet turned fabric storage

Earlier this summer I scored two small desktop filing systems for free! I immediately knew I wanted to spray paint them a fun color and use them to house all my fabric that lost it's home due to the baby. My summer project has been to completely clear out my entire craft room and all it's contents so we can turn it into the nursery. We have a three bedroom home and when we first moved in my husband took one room for his office and I took the other for my crafts. Now with a little one on the way we need one of those bedrooms for the nursery. I always knew I would lose my craft room to the nursery and I thought it would be so sad and awful but it has been the opposite. Instead of trying to relocate to the basement or other corner of the house I decided to just get rid of EVERYTHING! Well almost everything. I am keeping my knitting and sewing. Thus the need for fabric storage. These came to me just at the right time.

I really wanted to keep the hardware silver but couldn't figure out how to remove it so instead I wrapped the handle part in painter's tape.

Then I gave it a coat of primer.

Once that was COMPLETELY dry I gave it a few light coats of green spray paint.

I've learned over the years that MANY light coats is much better than one heavy, blotchy, drippy coat.

I let this dry overnight to make sure it was completely set before assembling. I didn't want any stickiness, especially since I was dealing with drawers.

Here is the finished product.

It holds my fabric, buttons, needles, thread and other small necessities perfectly. I love how easy it is to find the fabric I am looking for or get an easy glance of every different color, pattern and texture for when I need some inspiration.

Now I just need to figure out where to keep it. Maybe in a closet with the sewing machine?